Jash Dholani Profile picture
Jun 2 13 tweets 6 min read Twitter logo Read on Twitter
Alexander the Great won 9 battles

Julius Caesar won 16

Napoleon? THIRTY EIGHT

17 of them with impossible odds

Half a dozen EMPIRES had to join hands to stand a chance against him

Yet his wife slept with other men

The tragic love story of one of the greatest men of all time: Image
1/ Joséphine

An aristocrat’s daughter, a widow, mother of 2

Also 6 years older than Napoleon

On the marriage certificate she increased Napoleon’s age by 1.5 years and decreased hers by 4

Wedding was officiated by an illegitimate priest

Napoleon was just an army officer Image
2/ Napoleon’s love for her - despite her age, previous children, and his family’s great disapproval - could only be described as wild and profound. From a love letter: “The remembrance of last night’s delirium have robbed my senses of repose. My waking thoughts are all of thee.” Image
3/ Joséphine hardly ever wrote back

In 1796 Napoleon wrote:

“You do not write me at all, you do not love your husband; you know the pleasure that your letters afford him, and you do not write him six lines of even haphazard scribble.”

Future Emperor, left on “read” Image
4/ As Napoleon led his men to impossible victories, his spirit stayed agitated and morose

He wrote to Joséphine, telling her he can’t muster a response to “How did you sleep?” without knowing how she slept

He wanted his “genius” to protect her, and leave him “unguarded” twitter.com/i/web/status/1… Image
5/ The thought of Joséphine kept Napoleon sane in the middle of INHUMAN emotional and physical turmoil:

“When I’m weary of the worries of my profession, when men disgust me, when I’m ready to curse my life, I put my hand on my heart where your portrait beats in unison.” Image
6/ Napoleon was haunted by the suspicion that Joséphine loved him “less” with each passing day

This idea, he wrote, “blights my soul, stops my blood, makes me wretched without even leaving me the courage of fury”

He was right

She was cheating on him immediately after marriage ImageImage
7/ Napoleon to Joséphine:

“I haven't drunk one cup of tea without cursing the pride and ambition which force me to remain apart from the moving spirit of my life. If I rise to work in the middle of the night, it is because this may hasten by a matter of days our meeting." Image
8/ Joséphine had the GALL to come visit Napoleon with the man she was cheating on him with

And when Napoleon came for her, she was nowhere to be seen:

“I arrive at Milan, I rush into your apartment, I have left everything to see you, to press you in my arms…you were not there” Image
9/ Napoleon’s last words: “France, the army, head of the army, Joséphine”

He divorced her

But never got over her

Affairs didn’t help

The pain of not being loved back by her lingered on

I’m reminded of a line from a letter he wrote in 1796: “I had the right to be spared this” Image
“I had the right to be spared this” Image
Besides being a heartbroken lover...

Napoleon was an obsessive workaholic, a voracious reader, an incredible ruler, and the scariest general of his time

He also had a golden tongue

I've collected Napoleon's most interesting ideas and sayings here: memod.com/jashdholani/bo… Image
Thank you for reading fren

I appreciate your time

RT for Napoleon🫡🫡🫡

👇

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May 28
In D.H. Lawrence’s hypnotic and powerful short story SUN (1928), Juliet, a sick woman, is prescribed sun therapy by her doctor. She starts sunbathing naked and magical changes happen in her body, psyche, and being. The “cold dark clots of her thoughts” start dissolving. A thread: Image
1/ Juliet’s sun-bathing sessions turn her into an aristocrat:

She develops a “contempt for human beings altogether”

Why?

Because they are “un-elemental” and “unsunned”

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May 27
Before James Burnham turned right, led psychological warfare for the CIA, and declared total war on communism...

He was a Marxist activist

In The Managerial Revolution (1941), he accurately predicted the future:

A tyranny of bureaucrats

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1/ Capitalism ruled for the past few centuries and was supported by concepts such as

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Individualism not in fashion..
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May 25
Meet Ralph Waldo Emerson

He went to Harvard at 14

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On his 220th birthday today, discover Emerson's insights on great men, why you NEED conflict, and more👇🏻 Image
1/ Emerson on how worthy peers pull clarity and greatness out of us:

“I can say to you what I cannot first say to myself. Other men are lenses through which we read our own minds.”

Certain ideas - and even certain acts - are only extracted from us in the presence of greatness
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Inexplicable attraction will pull each man to become the “agent and interpreter” of something

He will sense his TASK

For Euclid it was “lines,” for Dalton it was “atomic forms”

For you? ImageImage
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May 25
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The most powerless creature in the world is not an ant, not the grounded plant, but a nihilist. The ant and the plant will automatically fight to preserve themselves but this central instinct of life has been removed from the nihilist's toolkit. He is compromised beyond saving
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May 23
Napoleon Thread 🧵

Balzac was a big fan of Napoleon Bonaparte

In 1838, he combed through hundreds of Napoleon speeches and public gazettes

He collected Napoleon's best insights in a book

10 aphorisms by Napoleon on courage, equality, and more👇🏻 Image
1/ Napoleon on freedom:

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Power is always concentrated at the top -

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Napoleon sought power not for the sake of control

But to create something NEW Image
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Dig in👇🏻 Image
1/ What is beautiful?

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Small babies and little kittens are beautiful - and easy to love

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They call each other baby and darling ImageImage
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